


What Thunder Tries To Hide

by anignoranthistorian



Category: Anne with an E (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Author Anne, Bad Reputation, But not all of it, F/M, cancel culture, memories of childhood abuse, some of it is dark
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-06-15
Updated: 2020-06-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 18:38:19
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 7,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24730171
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/anignoranthistorian/pseuds/anignoranthistorian
Summary: Anne Shirley-Cuthbert is a well-known and celebrated author with a difficult past that she has filed neatly away, never to be revisited again. When an edited version of a police report is leaked to the media, a public hungry to crucify its heroes makes Anne its next victim. Perhaps there's no coming back from this. Perhaps the most she can do is minimize damage and protect the people she cares about from dying by the same cruel hand.But Gilbert Blythe won't stand for this sort of martyrdom.
Relationships: Gilbert Blythe/Anne Shirley
Comments: 39
Kudos: 84





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello!
> 
> So once again my brain has given The People what The People have not asked for. 
> 
> Anne Shirley-Cuthbert is canceled. 
> 
> On a serious note, please be aware that there is a brief mention of suicide in this first chapter and proceed with caution.
> 
> Best,
> 
> S

**AUTHOR ANNE SHIRLEY-CUTHBERT: THE CUNNING AND CALCULATION OF CANADA’S** **MOST CELEBRATED YOUNG WRITER**

**13 YEAR OLD SHIRLEY-CUTHBERT: “I WANTED HIM TO DIE... I DID WHAT I HAD TO TO LIVE”**

**OPINION: ANNE SHIRLEY-CUTHBERT’S LIES ARE AS BAD AS THE SIN ITSELF**

**LEAKED POLICE RECORDS SHOW SHIRLEY-CUTHBERT PLAYED ACTIVE ROLE IN DEATH OF FOSTER FATHER**

**22 YEAR OLD AUTHOR ANNE SHIRLEY-CUTHBERT IN HOT WATER AFTER POLICE RECORD LEAK**

“Anne,” Matthew Cuthbert said softly from the doorway of his adoptive daughter’s childhood bedroom. “Come away from there. Let’s close the curtains.”

“Jerry’s already closed the gates,” Anne said dully, never turning around, her attention fixed to the papers and magazines and their headlines that lay sprawled before her. 

“Yes, but they’re all still out there. They can see right in.” Matthew moved quickly to close the shades, the cameras’ flash momentarily blinding him. “Marilla has people on the phone asking questions. What should she tell them?”

It was like Anne was submerged in water. The real world called out for her, demanding answers, pressing for some sort of explanation which could be promptly rejected, torn apart and spit out. But for these first moments in her new hell, Anne was relatively safe underwater, where she couldn’t really hear, couldn’t really see. She could think. She could plan out the story she would tell. She would save herself from this. She always saved herself, rising up from the dead, time after time after time. 

“No comment,” Anne breathed, just as her lawyers had instructed. “No comment right now.”

Matthew retreated. For the first time in the three days since she fled New York, Anne reached for her phone and opened up social media. She trained her eyes ahead as the app loaded. Slowly she let her gaze fall to the screen. It took her a few moments to understand what she was seeing. She had been tagged in post after post of the same black and white photo. Another moment had gone by before she realized she was looking at the limp legs of a woman, low to the ground, with her upper half lying inside of something. An oven?

“ **Kill yourself @annewithane** ” the caption read.

_ Was that Sylvia Plath? _

Anne’s hands shook. Her phone fell heavily to the floor. 

She could feel it then, as she’d felt it once before, years ago: the weight of the world crashing down on her chest, suffocating her. The mere minutes that had shaped her life, that she had so carefully found ways to file away, came flooding back to her mind, to her limbs, to her fingers and her toes. And she was there again, in Nova Scotia, in the Hammonds’ yard, her backside raw from his belt, head foggy with concussion, neck purple from pressure-- her punishment for her plan to escape.

And she could feel his weight on her suddenly, his half-dead body draped across hers. 

She had filed that memory away, never to be revisited. And she was supposed to be safe from that memory, with her money and her fame and the public’s good will towards the kind, sweet, whimsical author. 

She peered through the drapes, through the rain, and saw dozens of photographers and journalists standing in wait at the gates of Green Gables. Two black cars were let through the gates and a few minutes later, public relations specialists and personal assistants were flooding her room.

No one asked for the truth. 

A bulky man found his way to her doorway. “We need a list of people it’s okay to let in,” he said to the group at large.

“Who’s ‘we’?” Anne questioned.

“Security.”

“There’s no list. My parents are here, there’s no one else to let in--”

“There’s a man who’s been at the gate for half an hour. He won’t go. Says you’ll let him in if I give his name.”

“I really doubt it,” Anne whispered to herself. “Who, though?” She asked, a bit louder.

“Gilbert Blythe.”

_ Not him. _

But she was already halfway down the stairs. “Matthew,” she called out. “Matthew, you have to go tell him to leave. This is not a good place for him. This is nothing I want him involved in!”

“Anne? Who are you talking about?” Her father called from the living room. She hurried to find him.

“Gilbert Bly--”

She stopped in her tracks. Soaked to the bone, Gilbert Blythe rose from the sofa and turned to face her.

“Anne,” he said. “My God.”

  
  
  
  



	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!
> 
> This chapter is full of what I consider "necessary filler." Here's a bit of backstory, essentially.
> 
> I do want to give a trigger warning, as there are two brief mentions of an eating disorder in this chapter.
> 
> Best,  
> S

She knew she must look hollow to him. She looked hollow even to herself, but she stared defiantly ahead, daring him to say something about her appearance. 

He took the bait. “Anne, what happened? You don’t look like you’re well.”

She managed a laugh, as though it was all a joke. “They had me dye my hair blonde for a screen test. They want me to play Imogen for the film adaptation of  _ Lies I Chose to Believe,  _ and, of course, I  _ had  _ to bring up every other paragraph that she has white-blonde hair.” She rolled her eyes for dramatic effect.

“But--”

She was used to convincing people all was well. To not worry. To stay away. “And I know I’m a little slimmer than when you last saw me, but I haven’t really been doing anything different. I guess I just finally shed some baby fat.”

He looked at her, a frown on his face. “Anne--”

“Gilbert, you shouldn’t be here. You’ve walked into a medieval siege!”

“I know. I saw. I couldn’t stay away,” he explained. “Anne, they can’t just write these things about you. This is defamation! Do you have a lawyer? Are they sending out cease and desist letters? Is anyone looking out for you?”

But she was so tired, and though his questions were earnest and coming from a place of sympathy, so much of it sounded to her overtaxed mind like “how could you let this happen?”

“I have lawyers. They’re looking into things. You really shouldn’t be here--”

He came to her quickly, taking her hands. “You’ve said that, but I’m not going anywhere.” She sighed. “Hey!” He said, squeezing her hands. “You can’t push me away this time. Not without a good explanation.”

“Gilbert, please. Let’s not do this now. You shouldn’t be here--”

“Well I  _ am _ here--”

“Well it doesn’t matter, because I’m leaving!” She announced. Matthew, who had been attempting to give the two privacy, turned then.

“What?” He said to his daughter. “Anne, you can’t leave. It’s not safe for you right now.”

“I’ll be okay!” She assured him. “I know you and Jerry need to get out to the fields, and you can’t do that with those people hanging around. I can just go back to New York--”

“What?” Marilla had heard this half of the conversation. “You go back to New York over my dead body!”

Anne took a deep breath. “All right: I’ll go somewhere else. Los Angeles? Maybe London?”

“Those places are full of media and photographers,” Gilbert pointed out.

“I don’t want you going to those places alone, Anne,” Marilla said. “I’ll come with you if you’re leaving.”

“No, Marilla--”

“Come with me to Montreal,” Gilbert blurted. “There’s no paparazzi to speak of there. You’ll be left alone.”

The four shared a look. “I can’t do that to you, Gilbert. They could follow us. They came all the way to Avonlea.”

“I’m not afraid of them,” he said boldly.

Anne thought that he had no idea what he was talking about. 

“Go with Gilbert, Anne,” Marilla encouraged. “Then you’re not alone. I’ll feel so much better knowing you two are together.”

She looked to Matthew. “I think you should go with Gilbert. If not, Marilla will go with you.”

And so here she was again, presented with a hopeless choice by the people around her: subject her mother to her nightmare, or inflict it on Gilbert Blythe. She closed her eyes and sat on the couch, her hand finding the wet spot Gilbert had left behind. “I’m tired,” she told them. She’d been tired for years now. 

Anne Shirley-Cuthbert had signed a five-book deal with Schönbrunn Publishing House, aged 17. Previous to this deal, she had only had three short stories published. And so, until age 20, she considered this a wonderful arrangement. They paid her an advance of $150,000, to her an exorbitant sum. More importantly, it was enough to pay for NYU. 

She had been quite certain she ranked among the gods in terms of her good fortune. She had parents who loved her, who wished her well, friends from school who kept in touch and sent cards and letters through the mail, she had her first novel published and on bookshelves across North America. And she had Gilbert. 

Two and a half years separated Anne from Gilbert. They’d been neighbors from the time she came to live at Green Gables. She could still see him there, in her mind’s eye. Fifteen years old, still boyish, coming to find her in the patch of woods on her second day of school, lured by Billy Andrews, who lied and said it was a short cut to the bus stop. 

He sat with her on the bus, asking again and again for her name. But she already knew his: Gilbert Blythe. 

And Ruby Gillis had dibs. 

From that day on, Gilbert would make it a habit to meet Anne at the gates of Green Gables, even though she would ignore him, even though she would make her displeasure known.

“Why do you bother?” She asked him one day in December. 

“If I walk you to the bus stop, it makes it easier to slay dragons for you,” he said with a playful smile, walking a few steps ahead of her. “And I’m not afraid!”

The Gillises moved to Charlottetown when Anne was 15. In a long text to their group chat, Ruby announced that she had met a boy who fit her romantic ideal in a way Gilbert Blythe had  _ never. _ She was, therefore, relinquishing dibs. 

It was Gilbert’s last year of high school, and he wasn’t nearly so boyish. Since his offer to slay dragons, his own father had passed away and he had been put into the care of family friends, a married couple his father had known. Bash and Mary were good people. Anne admired them for how they guided Gilbert out from under the cloud that had lingered from the time of his father’s death. 

Everyone said Gilbert was “a good boy.” He was going to the University of Toronto, pre-med to boot. In contrast, everything Anne did she did to be thought of as “a good girl,” but it never came to fruition. Not in Avonlea, at least, where she was always, to some degree, an outsider. 

To be a Good Girl would be to atone for everything that had happened in her life before. To be Good would mean she deserved happiness with Marilla and Matthew, and that, perhaps, she was worthy of this boy who asked again and again for her name and her story and who was prepared to slay her dragons with or without it. 

The two teenagers had seemingly choreographed the most bizarre dance, always stepping around one another, never saying what they meant when the moment called for it. That dance continued beyond her 16th birthday, passed the close of the school year, all the way through the summer. 

Notes were written but seemingly never afforded the courtesy of a response, but in reality were lost or shredded. This was the final, most intimate step in their strange waltz, the final turn which made onlookers hold their breath. 

It was September, his last night in Avonlea before he left for university. Bash and Mary were upstairs changing, getting ready to take him out for a goodbye dinner. They’d even hired a babysitter for the evening. 

Diana Barry walked through the door, her nose in the air, and went straight for the baby, Delphine.

“Hello,” Gilbert said awkwardly, unsure what he had done to incur the girl’s displeasure. 

“You have a lot of nerve, Gilbert Blythe,” she said with a sneer. “Speaking to me after all you’ve done.  _ Or haven’t done _ .”

“I’m sorry to hear I’ve offended you, but you’re going to have to give me some more details.”

Her frown etched deeper into her face. “One word: Anne.”

Gilbert felt the blood drain from his face. “What about Anne? Is she upset with me?”

Diana’s jaw dropped, unable to comprehend the stupidity she was witnessing. “She’s  _ heartbroken _ , Gilbert! How could you just ignore her letter? Even if you didn’t feel the same? That’s  _ heartless--” _

“What letter?”

“Don’t--”

“Diana,  _ what letter _ ?”

Within minutes, Gilbert was halfway to Green Gables.

Anne sat on her porch, as she did every evening, her copy of Sylvia Plath’s  _ Ariel _ in her hand. It’s the sound of his foot falling on the creaky step that pulled her attention to him. 

“Anne,” he began, but before he could finish she was on her feet, fleeing for the door. “I didn’t get your letter!” He said loudly. She stopped, the door halfway open and still in her hand. “I didn’t get it, but I love you.”

And he stayed in love, even though Marilla Cuthbert didn’t think it appropriate for Anne to date Gilbert while she was still in school. He called her every night, sometimes read and edited her essays. He sent flowers for her birthday and Valentine’s Day. He told her outright: he loved her, whether she was his girlfriend or not.

She said the same. 

Though it felt like an eon, eventually June came the year she was 18. Among picnic tables and grocery store cakes in the garden of Green Gables (a celebration of Anne’s graduation and her book deal), Gilbert caught Marilla Cuthbert’s eye and gestured over to Anne, who stood fifteen feet away in conversation with Diana. The older woman rolled her eyes and nodded her head. 

He approached the girls, unable to contain his grin as he took Anne’s hand in his. She laughed as she realized what he had come over to do. She looked over to her parents, who dramatically covered their eyes. The party laughed good naturedly as Anne and Gilbert, Gilbert and Anne shared a kiss.

Later that summer they snuck more intimate moments. With all of their waiting and all of their love, Anne had filed these moments away, labelling them as categorically “good.” These sweet intimacies with the boy from next door, who had always adored her, bolstered her confidence.

Her first novel, a piece of historical fiction set in Boston in 1915, was published in August, just before she moved into the dorms at NYU. Gilbert accompanied the Cuthberts to New York to help her move in. They walked the broad city streets until they found a large bookstore. And there it was, in the “New Fiction” section:  _ Lies I Chose to Believe  _ by Anne Shirley-Cuthbert, 288 pages bound in a sepia-colored hardback cover. 

Those first few months as a  _ real  _ author were easy. Her publishers had asked only two things of her: start a YouTube channel and do a city-wide book tour. And so on Thursdays Anne uploaded videos where she did anything from analyze a poem to attempt to sew a 1890s dress pattern with puffed sleeves. 

She filmed vlogs of her and her friends making chicken pot pie in the shared kitchen. She staged a 15 minute long comedic production of  _ Moby Dick.  _ She gave dramatic recitations of Tennyson and Shakespeare, which she interspersed with videos in which she spoke candidly about her history of being bullied. She spoke to the importance of fostering and adopting children and asked people to reconsider their definition of a family. In weeks where she was overwhelmed with coursework, she would post a live stream of her studying. She gained a humble following.

It did what her publishing house had hoped it would: it got New Yorkers to attend her book signings, and sales numbers began to rise. 

In December, things shifted dramatically. Reese Witherspoon had added  _ Lies I Chose to Believe _ to her Book Club. Sales skyrocketed. Anne was being asked onto talk shows, where hosts would play clips from her YouTube videos, solidifying her as a talented, and above all, wholesome, young author. 

People began approaching Anne in public, recognizing her by her vivid red hair. They would ask for photos and signatures. Some would ask for spoilers. What happened next to Imogen and her Samuel? When was the sequel coming out? What will it be called?

Anne had no answers, except to say she had a test on Monday and she was just trying to make it through  _ that _ . 

It was during finals week, at the end of her Freshman year, that Schönbrunn began asking the very same questions. 

“Please, just one week,” she found herself saying through the phone as she paced in front of her British Literature classroom. “I’m nearly done and then we can talk about this with gusto.”

“When’s your last exam?”

“Friday morning,” she told them.

“We’ll have you on Kimmel for Friday night.”

“Kimmel? That’s filmed in Los Angeles.”

“Yes, we’ll have you on a flight out of JFK. You’ll make it in plenty of time.”

“But my dorm--”

“We’ll send someone to pack it up.”

She would end up spending the majority of the summer in California, bent over a keyboard by day, “networking” by night (or so her publishing house told her).They would send her to industry “get-togethers.” These were, in reality, raucous parties filled with proliferate drug use and sex. Sometimes, the rumor went, non-consensual.

She would brace herself as she entered the doors of a mansion, quite alone. She hadn’t thought of a way to say “no, I don’t want to go.” Everything was put to her as a certainty. 

Middle-aged men would find her and whisper down into her ear. She would excuse herself, sometimes locking herself in a bathroom until it was late enough to leave. She had never found a way to tell Gilbert what it was that happened at these parties, let alone what it was these men said. 

All of this in the name of securing the sale of the film rights to  _ Lies I Chose to Believe _ and its forthcoming sequels. 

She finished writing  _ The Hum of Evensong _ in August when she was 19, and it was on shelves by Christmas. For her 20th birthday, Schönbrunn told her they had found a studio eager to put her story on screen. At 20, Anne became a multi-millionaire. 

The money confounded her. It seemed bottomless. She found herself begging to extend kindnesses to her loved ones. She paid her friend Kyla’s tuition after her father had been in a car accident. She put a roof on Green Gables. She donated to charity as though she were a dying woman. And still: the money never gave out.

“Let me pay for the rest of medical school, Gilbert,” Anne pleaded that July as they lounged in the grass. “Or you could think of it like a stipend.”

This was the third time she’d raised this particular topic of discussion, though neither time before had gone particularly well. 

This time, he didn’t even respond. 

“Gil?”

He closed his eyes. “I said no, Anne.”

“That’s not fair, Gil: you would do it for me. Look me in the eye and tell me you wouldn’t do it for me.”

“I don’t want your money, Anne!” He nearly shouted. “I want  _ you,  _ and you are  _ never  _ here.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, her voice as quiet as his was loud. “I want to be.”

“Then why aren’t you?” He demanded. “Why do you stay in LA and New York all summer? What are those parties? What are you doing there? Why are they more important than your family? Why are they always more important than  _ me _ ?”

“You don’t know what it’s like,” she said with a shutter. “You can judge me, Gilbert Blythe, but you don’t know what it’s like!”

“Then tell me! What is it like?”

“It’s like I can’t say no! They don’t ask questions, they don’t ask for my opinion! They just. Say.  _ Go _ .”

He paused and Anne caught her breath. “You’re not their slave,” he told her.

She stood then and began to walk away. 

“Anne! Anne!” He called.

“I have no way to make you understand!” She yelled. 

They had her on a plane to New York the next morning. They sat her down in a conference room and explained how they wanted her to write the script for the film adaptation, and they needed it done by April. And they also needed the third book in the trilogy to be ready for publication by next November. And they also wanted a poetry collection. 

“I don’t really write poetry,” she told them.

“Well, this will be a great opportunity to start!”

The Fall semester was more difficult than she could have imagined. By November, she felt compelled to withdraw from the university to keep up her writing schedule. Her parents were disappointed. She couldn’t imagine what Gilbert would say....

But she had to do this. She had promised five books, and she had only delivered on two. And Schönbrunn had promised to count the screenplay as one of the five if they could publish it. Just the final book in the trilogy, a poetry collection, and a script.Then she would be free. 

She couldn’t imagine what Gilbert would say, so she didn’t tell him. She couldn’t tell him. She stopped answering his calls, stopped responding to his texts. She knew right away that what she did was cruel, but she was plagued by the idea that she couldn’t possibly love him the way he deserved if she wasn’t  _ free _ . 

Over the next year, everything flung off the rails. Suddenly she was being told that it would be  _ interesting  _ if she were to play Imogen, that she  _ should  _ play Imogen.

“I’m not an actress,” she said desperately.

“Oh, well we can get you some lessons, get you trained up--” On and on they went, describing their plan for her. “And really, you should lose 15 pounds.”

“What?” She breathed.

“Nothing personal, it’ll just look better for the camera. We’ll get you a nutritionist and you can start training--”

Anne pretended like it wasn’t real. She was terrified by the notoriety such a role would bring her. She would never be able to remain anonymous in a crowd again. She knew then that she was right to keep Gilbert away. She couldn’t protect him from this sort of fame, not even if he were only on the peripheries. 

But she took to the diet like a bird to flight, fascinated by the numbers, enchanted by the control she could have on this aspect of her life. Within a month and a half she was down 20 pounds. 

It was in February when she was 21, after they’d bleached her hair, that she found his email deep within her inbox.

**I still love you, Anne**

That was what he’d titled it, dated from New Year’s Day. She couldn’t bring herself to read it. Not when she wasn’t free. 

And now it was June again, and they stood in that farmhouse, surrounded by people who made their living off of her, boxed in by those who reveled in her failures, as it brought in a good story for a good price. 

These things that she had tried for years to keep away from her mother and father, to shield Gilbert Blythe from, they demanded to be known and faced. And she knew that they could not be beaten down. 

“I’ll tell you now,” she said quietly, eyes still closed on the wet couch. “That if they follow us to Montreal, there’s not enough courage in the world to see a person through.”

  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I also just want to say I was so happy to see your kind responses! It's so cool to know you guys are into this :)


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello! 
> 
> Again, another quick trigger warning for mentions of disordered eating. Please read with caution.

She looked ghostly, he thought, walking down the aisle of the plane. The faded freckles ran into the pale skin that blended into the white-blonde hair. The only color left on her were her auburn eyebrows. She was incredibly fragile. Each step she took, Gilbert felt sure she would tumble. He thought he could run a hand over her body and identify each bump as another bone. 

He wasn’t stupid. He was in his final year of medical school at McGill, and since he’d seen her, he’d had his psychiatry professor’s voice running through his head.

_ Anorexia nervosa _ , it whispered.

When she struggled to lift her bag into the overhead compartment, he took it from her. She wouldn’t look at him. 

A private plane had been chartered for the flight to Montreal. Her team, pushy and self-assured, sent him out of the house first, giving him a 45 minute head start to the airport. He spent 30 minutes alone, waiting for Anne to join him. This was the first time that it had truly occurred to him that Anne was a wealthy woman.

He saw her get out of the black sedan, stepping light-footed onto the tarmac. He saw the photographers lining the fence, 100 feet away. She readjusted the strap of her bag on her shoulder then boarded the flight, quickly and quietly. After taking her seat, she fell into silence, the side of her head resting against the window of the plane. He watched as she dozed.

“I’m tired,” she’d said, over and over, at Green Gables. 

He had so much to ask her, but she slept the entire flight, only awakening when the pilots announced that they were beginning descent. 

She blinked a few times and then looked to Gilbert.

“Do you have your car at the airport?”

“Yes, it’s in the parking garage. How do we, I mean, how do I… I’ve never flown on a private plane before. Will we be unloading onto the tarmac? How will I get to my car?”

“There’s usually some sort of shuttle that brings people to the parking garage, it’ll be fine,” she said with a yawn. “But I don’t really fly this way very often. I’m not the best person to ask.”

As soon as the flight landed, Anne was peering through windows, hunting for any sign of photographers. She insisted that she get off the plane first. She knew, at this point, she had few ways to protect Gilbert. She could at least make sure the coast was clear. 

The car ride was silent. Anne holds her breath when another car gets close, peering into their windows only to find a labrador rather than a camera lens. 

“Will you drive around your block before you stop?” Anne asks him. “Just to make sure no one is there?” 

Gilbert didn’t see much of a point: if they were being followed already, they’d surely be followed a block more. He agreed, though, eventually pulling in front of a Victorian brownstone, long since divided into individual units. He led her up a flight of stairs and watched her lean against the wall to rest as he unlocked the door. 

In an instant Gilbert was wishing he’d had the foresight to clean before leaving for Avonlea. In his defense, he was a busy man and he had left suddenly and unexpectedly. Just the day before, his phone had buzzed in his pocket while he stood in line at the hospital’s cafe before his shift started for his rotation. Absentmindedly, he pulled it out, a New York Times news update displayed across the screen.

**Anne Shirley-Cuthbert and the culpability of a child: in the throes of cancel culture, how far can we extend guilt?**

Immediately he was reading the article, an opinion piece that barely touched on why Anne had prompted the writer. Instead the writer took time to describe a murder committed by a group of children in Nashville and how the law sought to try them, commented on the history of the juvenile detention system, and then changed gears to question how far into the past we should judge our public officials’ choices. Are we who we were twenty years ago? 

And then there was Anne, nestled into the penultimate paragraph, framing the author’s initial question as to whether we as a society should be crucifying a young woman for actions she took as a child, and wondering if the crime was actually not making her remorse known before the truth came to light.

_ Actions she took as a child? _ Gilbert wondered.  _ What does that even mean? _

He searched social media for Anne’s handles, feeling sick to his stomach over what he found. Her twitter was flooded with pictures from the scene of Sylvia Plath’s suicide. Three of the top five trending hashtags all had to do with Anne.

#ASCIsOver

#CutCuthbert

#ASCTheBanshee

Then he found a TMZ article with the police documents, then a reddit post filled with conspiracy theories: she had sex with the executives at her publishing house, that’s how she got her book deal. She failed out of NYU after bribing her way in. She was literally a harbinger of death, evidenced by the passing of her neighbor John Blythe soon after her arrival on PEI. 

And it was all a huge joke to everyone in the comments. Someone shared the Pepe Silvia Wall of Crazy conspiracy theory meme alongside a comment:  _ lmao this is all of us rn _

There were photos of Anne coming out of her Manhattan apartment, towheaded and utterly swarmed by paparazzi, photos of her fighting her way through LaGuardia, a fan video of her hugging her knees to her chest while waiting for a connecting flight in Toronto, and yet more pictures of her climbing into the backseat of an SUV in Charlottetown before it drives away.

He stepped out of line and hurried to find the doctor he was shadowing. “A family emergency,” is what he’d called it. 

She walked into the apartment, stopped in the middle of the living room, then struggled to resettle the weight of her bag on her delicate shoulder.

“Can I take that from you?” He asked, stepping up alongside her. She nodded once, letting him take hold of the strap.

“I’m tired,” she repeated. “Would it be all right if I headed to bed?” It was four o’clock in the afternoon. She looked around, counting the doors.  _ One for the bathroom, one for the closet, one for a bedroom…. _ He watched as understanding came to her. “This is a one bedroom?” She asked, eyes wide. 

“It is,” he confirmed. “However you want to do this is fine by me.”

She looked to the couch in the living room, and the windows that faced west into the bright afternoon sunlight. “Can I rest in the bed now?” She wondered. “I can take the couch tonight when you’re ready to go to sleep.”

_ Oh _ . Part of him hoped that she would see this for what it was, a peace offering, an olive branch, a desperate plea asking her if things could go back to normal. Because, apparently, Gilbert Blythe didn’t have much in the way of dignity. 

It was November, a year and a half ago now, when his longtime girlfriend abruptly ghosted him. At first, he was terrified. Had something happened to her? Why hadn’t the Cuthberts contacted him? They knew he loved Anne. 

So he called the home phone at Green Gables and was mortified to learn that, no, nothing had happened to Anne, but she was going through something and was in the process of withdrawing from NYU. Hadn’t she told him?

And so he’d text her between classes and labs, urging her to tell him what was going on, reminding her she could always talk to him. For weeks he’d call her each night, being inevitably directed to voicemail, where he would leave her a message telling her he missed her and he loved her and he hoped she was well and to please, please call him. 

She didn’t come home for Christmas, and he couldn’t afford a trip to New York. It was more than a month before it hit him: Anne wasn’t his girlfriend anymore. 

He didn’t handle that well. 

It was months and months of him throwing himself into his studies and then into the hospital rotations. He’d dream of her, of her retreating from him the last time he saw her. “I have no way to make you understand!” She’d yelled over her shoulder. 

Was he the villain? Just another person who demanded things from her?

“Then tell me!” He’d insisted. “What is it like?”

It took him nearly a year to consider that maybe she had a reason for not telling him. It was around that time that he’d become friends with a medical resident, a woman they all called Winnie. It was enough to put the idea in his head that perhaps blondes were his type. By the end of December, he was getting up the nerve to ask her out to dinner. 

He didn’t worry about what Winnie would say, she could say yes or she could say no, and he knew it was the same to him. He thought only of what it would mean to leave Anne in the past. He’d remember an operation he’d observed, the surgeon’s hand wrapping around a man’s heart. That’s what it felt like to consider leaving Anne behind. 

Nursing his heartache, he’d written that pathetic email. It went unanswered. 

“If that’s what you want,” he told her, and she closed the bedroom door behind her.

A little after six, he stood at the bedroom door, hesitating. His task, in theory, was simple: to let her know dinner was ready. But he didn’t know how she would react, if she could be persuaded to eat with him. He didn’t know how to handle the fact that this woman that he loved was… not well. 

_ If anyone should be able to handle this sort of thing, it should be you, _ he thought to himself.  _ What sort of doctor will you make? _

So he knocked. “Anne,” he called through the door. “Wake up, I’ve made pork chops. They’re ready.”

A beat, a pause. “I’m all right,” she said, her voice groggy from sleep. “Maybe I’ll come out for a snack or something.”

This took him aback. “Sure,” he finally managed. “Help yourself to anything I have.”

A minute or two later and she emerged barefoot in the kitchen, immediately headed for the freezer. Here she shifted items around until she’d found her treasure. Dragging the entire box out, Anne looked it over intently. 

_ She’s reading the nutrition label,  _ Gilbert thought to himself.

Satisfied with what she found, Anne pulled an item from the box, a small smile on her face as she took her seat.

“Ice cream?” Gilbert said lightly, taking a bit of his rice. 

Anne shrugged. “Everyone loves a Klondike bar.” She ate it all within a few minutes then stood, headed back to the bedroom. 

It was nearly midnight. Gilbert knew he should rest, as he had to be at the hospital in the morning. Again, he hesitated before knocking on his own bedroom door, biting his lip.

“I’m tired,” that’s all she said, over and over. She never described herself as anything else. He’d expected “I’m nervous,” or “I’m afraid,” or even “I’m devastated,” but that’s not what she said, though. She just said “I’m tired.”

He let her sleep. 

  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I also just want to thank my friend Ohmygodnighttroll for their help coming up with a way to describe that dang meme haha.
> 
> I hope you're still enjoying the story!


	4. Chapter 4

She must have slept like the dead. She hadn’t woken up at 6:30 when Gilbert turned on the shower in the next room over, nor when the front door closed loudly behind him at 8. She wasn’t disturbed at 10:30 when the garbage trucks came round, and didn't wake to the sound of sirens at noon. The screaming baby in the shared corridor didn’t rouse her at 2. When her eyes peeled open at 3:42 she was still bone tired, without even the energy to roll away from the light pouring in through the gap in the curtains. At 5:01 she summoned the will power to feel around the bed for her phone.

There were six missed calls, all from various executives and PR managers at her publishing house. She set the phone down.

She stared blankly at the ceiling. 

Vaguely she heard a lock turn. “Anne?” He called. She hoped he would think she was still asleep and so she did not respond. 

Gilbert looked around his apartment. He checked the living room for unfolded throw blankets or rumpled pillows. With nothing disturbed he moved to the kitchen, expecting to find a half empty glass of water, or the plate soaking in the sink, leftover from the breakfast he’d prepared and left out for her. But the bagel still sat on the counter, the cream cheese rancid. It was as though no one had been in his home since he’d left that morning. Perhaps she’d had the courage to go out somewhere?

He opened his bedroom door. 

“Anne?”

She shot up in bed as he turned on the light switch. He could see, even from the doorway, that her bleached hair was a tangled, matted mess, her face puffy, the clothes she’d worn yesterday hanging limply from her body. 

“Hey,” she said, smoothing out her hair.

“Hey,” he replied. “Did I… wake you up?”

“Oh, um, not really. No. I’m just resting.”

“Oh.” They remained there, simply looking at one another. Anne waited for him to retreat, to grant her privacy. He waited for her to offer an explanation as to why she was in bed so early, or so late, in the day.

“So what did you do today?” He asked casually, kicking off his shoes. 

“Oh,” she said with another one of her forced laughs. “Not much.”

“Yeah?” He asked. “Did you see the bagel I made you?”

Anne felt her heart beating in her chest. “Oh, no! I’m sorry, I must have missed it--”

“It was right on the counter. You’d see it the moment you stepped out of the bedroom. It’s a clear line of sight.”

Gilbert hadn’t meant to challenge her so soon, hadn’t meant to push her or demand answers, but there was something so distressing about that unnoticed plate of food, he could hardly hold his tongue. 

“I don’t know what you want me to tell you, Gilbert,” she said smoothly. “I just didn’t see it.”

“Okay,” he said, stepping closer to the bed. “So what did you do? What did you eat?”

Anne moved to stand, her legs unbearably stiff as she swung them over the side of the bed. “I’m not very comfortable with that question,” she said harshly. “And who are you to ask me about what I eat? That’s bad manners--”

“Yeah,” he scoffed. “Maybe in L.A. where no one eats--”

“Stop.”

There was an iciness in her voice, in her eyes and in her face, that Gilbert was unused to. It made her seem rather foreign to him.

Satisfied with his silence and dazed stillness, Anne swept out of the room. Gilbert heard the click of the lock on the bathroom door a moment later. Half an hour later, Anne was laying out blankets on the couch, wet hair wrapped in a towel. When the makeshift bed was made, Anne moved to close the curtains tightly shut. The towel was soon flung into a hamper and Anne settled herself in for the night, body turned away from the room, face buried in a pillow as Gilbert prepared his dinner. He didn’t call her to the table this time. 

On Wednesdays Gilbert shadowed Dr. Cusson, a half-deaf septuagenarian OB/GYN. Nurses bustled around them, saying whatever they pleased, knowing the doctor would never know. 

“Hey, Gilbert,” he heard a woman’s voice call. 

Dr. Rose stood down the hall, a patient’s charts in her hands. She smiled, beautiful and warm. Gilbert was immediately struck by her ability to make him feel welcome, like she wanted him to speak and be heard. 

“Hey, Winnie,” he said. He thought back six months, to when he considered asking her to dinner. He wondered what his life would be like now if he had. Perhaps he’d be half a year into a relationship. But how would he explain how he had to fetch Anne and bring her back to Montreal? How he had to know she was safe?

Would he even have gone to Anne in Avonlea if he had Winnie to explain it to?

Having begun his day particularly early, he was home by mid-afternoon, this time to find Anne perched on the edge of the couch. Head in her hands, fingers gripping the roots of her hair as though clinging on for dear life, he could hear muffled voices coming over the speaker phone.

“You can’t just abandon this project,” came a man’s voice. “Do you know how much money has been put into the production of this movie? How many livelihoods are on the line?”

“I’ve told you, though,” Anne’s voice came, almost like a child’s whine. “ _ No one _ wants to see me in this movie, especially now. The fans, they’ve always pictured Samuel as Timothee Chalamet, so that’s fine. That’s great that you got him! But they don’t want to see me making out with Chalamet--”

Gilbert thought to himself that  _ he  _ didn’t want to see her making out with Chalamet.

“--and they want Saiorse Ronan. A real actress! They want Chalamet and Ronan, they always have--”

“Saoirse Ronan is filming a BBC mini-series,” a woman’s voice sneered. 

“Okay,” Anne said, a note of desperation in her voice. “What about… Elle Fanning?”

“Filming the next season of  _ The Great. _ ”

“Dakota?”

“Fanning?!”

“Yes…”

“She hasn’t been in anything in years--”

“Sophie Turner?”

“Pregnant.”

“Watson?”

“Too old.”

“Pugh?”

“Tied to a remake of  _ Peter Pan _ .”

“Moretz?”

“Taking time out of work for school.”

There was a beat. “Anya Taylor-Joy?” Anne ventured weakly.

What could have simply been a “no” turned into a long lecture that Gilbert felt uncomfortable even listening to as he attempted to make himself busy in the kitchen. He saw as Anne muted the phone while the harsh voices continued their tirade. He saw how her long, blonde hair fell over her face and how her shoulders began to shake. Gilbert found himself setting down the pan, closing the fridge door, and hurrying over to the couch. 

Hesitantly, he took a seat beside her. Unsure, he wrapped an arm around her. The diatribe continued and so did her tears. Eventually, he heard a man’s voice call out: “What do you think of this?”

Anne was hiccuping, on the verge of hysterics. In all, incapable of speaking to these brutes. 

Slowly Gilbert reached to unmute the phone. “Hello?” He called out.

“Hello? Who are we speaking with?”

“It hardly matters. I’ve just come on to tell you Anne’s not feeling well and the call is now ending--”

Anne lifted her head from her hands, eyes wide and mouth agape in horror.

He put a finger to her lips.

“Ending? What are you talking about? Anne, are you there? I insist--”

“I insist you speak to Anne only when she’s feeling up to it. Enjoy your evening.”

With a click, the call was over.

“Gilbert,” Anne choked. “You  _ can’t _ hang up on them!”

“It’s already been done,” he said with a shrug. “You didn’t tell me they were so… harsh.”

Anne took a steadying breath. “Yes, well…”

“Come to think of it, you never told me much about what happens with the publishing house. Or with the production studio.”

  
  


“Hmm…” said Anne.

“I just wonder why that is,” he said quietly. “I just wonder, you know, even after all this time, why you would never talk to me about how these people treat you.”

She looked at him then, her lip quivering with... sadness? Anger? “Well, I’d hardly want to make it anyone else’s problem, would I?”

“So you thought…” Gilbert took a moment to think about what he would say next. “You thought you would be burdensome? If you talked to someone about this?”

“No, not burdensome,” she hissed. Gilbert saw then that this was a feral creature, not his Anne. “They  _ eat  _ people.”

Gilbert’s breath was taken away. He thought back to that last day, out on the grass in Avonlea, where she told him she couldn’t make him understand. And if she’d said then what she’s said now, that they  _ eat  _ people, he surely wouldn’t have. But now, seeing her here, with little left to her but the bone, he could see it. He could understand it. 

“They might eat you,” she said, apparently practicing her acting skills as her tone was low and even, nothing like what she felt. “Like they’ve eaten me.”

  
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Listen guys, I have no idea what a fourth year medical student in Canada would be doing, but I'm trying. I'll have you know, though, that all of my YouTube ads are for medical schools now lol.
> 
> I'll try to cut through some of the angst in the next chapter, but here's something for now. Hope you liked it!


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